It’s Cool to be Conservative

After a piece I wrote about my Democrat friends, one of my readers asked the question, “How in the world can you stomach friends that voted to ruin our country?” 

It’s a really good question.  My Democrat friends did in fact vote to destroy the freedom and prosperity which we all enjoy.  The short answer is that I believe there’s salvation, even for those who’ve made egregious mistakes — as we all have.  The long answer is that we need them.  Somewhere around half of the voters (regardless of what you think of the election) chose the socialist alternative that the Democrats were offering.  We can’t return our country to its founding principles without addressing the half of the citizenry that is ready to abandon those principles.

I believe there are actually two general categories of Democrat voters.  The first are the true leftist zealots who are committed to achieving some form of socialism.  They don’t value individual liberty.  They seek top-down control of every aspect of our society.  Their idea of utopia is a world in which elites with superior education manage all aspects of our lives — how we assemble, what we may say, and how we must live.  Their objectives are diametrically opposed to those of our founders.  They can’t be reasoned with, and shouldn’t be bargained with.

But the second, and larger, group of Democrat voters has more promise.  Although they would never call themselves “conservatives,” they actually love America and value its founding principles.  Even so, they continue to vote for politicians promising some variant of socialism.  They’ve been captives of a propaganda campaign for so long that they’re no longer making rational choices.  They suffer from political “Stockholm syndrome.”  They’ve come to accept the narrative that’s been fed to them by media and academia.

• They don’t support unlimited abortion, but Republicans are against women’s health.
• They don’t support open borders, but Republicans are cruel racists.
• They like energy independence, but Republicans want to destroy the environment.
• They don’t support a welfare state, but Republicans want the poor to go away and die.

They’ve heard the constant drumbeat that Republicans are evil, so they default to voting Democrat.  Lenin had a label for those who vote against their own interests — useful idiots.

So how does one lead the useful idiots out of the fog?  Not by debating with them.  Even though they claim to be members of the “party of science,” they vote according to their feelings.  Their positions are emotion-based.  Facts won’t change their feelings.  When challenged with facts they’ll just keep repeating the same talking points over and over.  It feels good to vote Democrat, so they continue doing so — regardless of its effect on real-world outcomes.

We need to change their feelings, not their minds.  We’ll only get them to join the conservative movement when it feels better than the liberal movement.  We’ll beat liberalism the same way we beat smoking and racism — by making it socially awkward.  We can worry about policy discussions later.

Conservatives joke that Democrats are the evil party and Republicans are the stupid party.  It’s time to change that paradigm.  Let’s make the Democrats the silly party and Republicans the cool party.  I know what you’re thinking, but bear with me.  It’ll be easier than it sounds.

It’s time to give the left a taste of their own rules — that is, Rules for Radicals by Saul Alinsky.  Specifically, let’s use rule number 5:

Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.  There is no defense.  It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule.  Also, it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.

Let’s make the Democrats the silly party by mocking them mercilessly.  Fortunately, they’re playing along.  Just look at their leadership:

• President Asterisk – calls his voters derogatory names (lying dogface pony soldier?)
• Speaker Antoinette – damns Donald Trump to hell when she’s not praying for him
• President in Waiting Harris — Rode Willie Brown to the top (and I don’t mean his coattails)
• Governor Cuomo – groper of daughters and killer of grandmothers
• Governor Whitmer – tried to beat a virus by mandating only non-motorized boats
• Governor Newsom – closed the churches, but kept the movie studios open
• Representative Ocasio-Cortez – bringing the wisdom of a bartender to Congress

But even though the Democrats have made themselves silly, how can we possibly make Republicans cool?  The Democrats are helping on that front as well.  Did the Democrats project anything other than anger and grievance in the last election?  They’re also the party of doddering old fools — just look at the best they had to offer in the last presidential election.  Seriously, Slow Joe Biden was their best offering — and I don’t mean that sarcastically — he really was.

Conversely, we have youth on our side, with leaders like Ron DeSantis, Kristi Noem, Dan Crenshaw, Candace Owens, and Ben Shapiro.  Also, Republicans have become the anti-establishment party.  What could be cooler than that?  Donald Trump even showed us how to embrace our new coolness.  MAGA rallies, boat parades, motorcycle gatherings, and pickup truck convoys were cool.  It was fun to be a part of it.  More importantly, conservatism became something to be proud of — rather than apologetic for.

If you’re invited to two parties — do you go to the one where everyone is mad and shouting — or do you go to the one where everyone is happy and laughing?  Barbara Mandrell sang, “I was country, when country wasn’t cool.”  Well, we were conservatives when conservatism wasn’t cool.  That started changing about five years ago.  We need to keep that change going.  Let’s celebrate who we are, have fun doing it, and mock the left relentlessly.  If we do this right, within a few years, voters will long to hang with the cool party.

This article was originally published by American Thinker.

Photo by Robert Vandlik at Flickr.